Roman Vladimirovich Davydov was an outstanding person. The Soviet director of animation was an exceptionally integral, original daredevil innovator. With the author's naive and primitive formation of the concepts of his work, he was known as a selflessly hardworking and efficient person.
Biographical facts
Davydov Roman was born in the spring of 1913, during the heyday of Russian culture, named by the French poet P. Valerie one of the wonders of the world. The future animator from early childhood was attracted by an eccentric and stylistics. However, he began his education by studying at the Moscow Industrial College. Very soon, the young man showed an extraordinary talent of the painter. Therefore, in 1932, Davydov Roman, led by youthful maximalism, takes part in the competition of cartoonists. To the surprise of the majority, a brave self-taught person achieves victory and decides to improve his skills. To this end, he continues his studies at the courses of cartoonists organized by the Crocodile magazine.
In an effort to become one of the best in the professional field, in 1937, Davydov took courses in the specialty "animator", which are held by the Soyuzmultfilm studio. After their successful completion, Davydov works as an animator, collaborating with leading directors of domestic animation Mstislav Pashchenko, Vladimir Polkovnikov, Ivan Ivanov-Vano , Dmitry Babichenko and many others. This fact is evidenced by a photo of Roman Davydov with prominent figures of Soviet animation, which decorated the studio lobby.
As a director
The directorial debut of Davydov Roman happened in 1956. At first, he removed the puppet ribbon "Kolobok", two years later - "Three Bears". But the most outstanding project of that time period is considered to be the animated film adaptation of R. Kipling's “The Jungle Book”. In the period from 1967 to 1971, an animated series was created, consisting of five interconnected parts, called "Mowgli". The director himself considered the film the main work of his creative career. This work of the director was undoubtedly the landmark achievement of the entire Soviet animation. The animated picture has earned high praise from artists and the love of a million viewers. In subsequent creative activities, Davydov Roman shot films in the genre of historical or fairy tales. His animated works “The Tale of Evpathy Kolovrat”, “Swans of Nepryadva”, “Childhood of Ratibor” received national fame.
Handwriting
Davydov Roman was notable for his extraordinary talent, but his strength and weakness was at the same time a combination of the incompatible into a single shell, a single schematized and stylized system. He selflessly revered the form of the graphics of his work. He harmoniously elevated the line modules and schematization of his characters to the through unity of thinning and condensation. Because of this, sometimes in his films and individual frames of paintings, the action acquired lifelessness and fake. At the same time, the masters did not care at all about the stiffness and dryness of the created images. His scenes were distinguished from the majority made by other animators by stylistic “combing”, rationality in constructing staging scenes and graphic “stubbornness”. The director boldly took up the film adaptation of radically opposite stories. He liked to struggle to solve the problem of harmonious combination of material and style. Repeatedly Davydov tried himself in volumetric animation.
Nothing passes without a trace
Being a Honored Art Worker of the RSFSR, Roman Davydov, whose biography is summarized in this publication, was pleased to pass on his experience and copyright to the younger generation of animators, teaching refresher art for animators. His classes were very popular, his students literally idolized their mentor. The master’s son, Alexander Davydov, followed in his father’s footsteps, choosing the profession of a director-animator. Alexander during his creative career took part in the production of about 100 animated films, the viewer he is known as the author of the beloved cartoon "New Adventures of the Keshi Parrot".
Roman Davydov did not have time to enjoy the triumph of his son. In the last years of his life, he suffered a severe form of stroke and for a long time was in a pre-infarction state. As a result, the body weakened by the disease finally malfunctioned. The great animator died in September 1988, but his creative heritage is immortal.